Pygmy

I was back on the hill to check my oat planting today and saw a flock of 8-9 birds....The poults were hard to tell from their mother...It was probably the brood I saw in late June when the poults were pheasant size....I also saw the hen with the small poults again...

Nice Gator......He be 'lebenty pounds plus.....Back in the glory days of Seneca Lake I weighed lots of them.. We would sometimes catch 20-30 pike in a morning's fishing, and fish weighing in the double digits were not rare...

Ask Bugsy.....He be an ENTOMOLOGIST !

Happy Birthday, Tacks !! 40 years old...Holy CRAP , at 40 years old I was in the best shape of my life.. I carried a lot of moose, caribou and elk meat between the years of 39 and 52... Get your young ass out there and KILL some stuff !!...Hehehehe

I agree with Critter....A small deer seems to be as much work to cut up as a big deer and you only get 1/2 as much meat... I don't shoot fawns for that reason... Back when my hunting area covered many more acres than It does now, I used to pick out the big old "trophy" does..More meat, and I never ate a doe I didn't like.. Now that I am hunting a smaller acreage, I try to select the medium sized does...I feel the big old matriarch does are the foundation of the deer herd on the property, and I'd rather see them survive...

SWEET rifle.....My first centerfire rifle was a 722 in .222 Rem.....I bought it used for $60 back in 1964 or so and sold it a few years ago for $600....

I have a MN and mine is very accurate also...Judging by its condition, it was probably captured in the 1939 Winter War and re-arsenaled by the Finns.. I would have no qualms about hunting with mine, but it is currently on display along with some of my other milsurps at the local American Legion Post..

Steve, Old Buddy ....I spotted that straight bolt handle...What is it ? I'm guessing a M96 Swede... You know I love vintage military rifles !

Bless your heart, tommyc....I also have a weakness for pretty young females... Actually in recent years, I seem to have a weakness for some pretty OLD females....<<sigh>>....

I'd wager that they are long, shiny and pointed too.....<<GRIN>>....

Layouts are a problem for me now... I have no problem lying down, but sitting up to shoot is a PROBLEM...And it's hard to swing the shotgun lying flat on my back..

Yeah, but that doesn,t mean I might not swap her in for a later model.....Hehehe.....

What caliber, Jeff ? I am guessing it's a .308, but Jack Stone had a M88 in .284 Win...

If you don't mind me saying, Larry, her stance looks pretty good to ME...<<sigh>>...

No brainer for me....Rem 700 Mountain Rifle in 7mm08 with a Burris 2x-7x and shooting Barnes 120 grain TTSX at about 3000 fps.... After that, who knows ? Perhaps my M70 Win in .280 Rem, or my Springfield 03A3 in 30-06, or perhaps my M1 Garand.....

I don't think that is unusual, Nick... They are not real spooky..A couple of years ago there was one that I saw up on The Mermaid's property several times when I was mowing....It let me get quite to it several times with the mower before it went back into the brush...I think it may have been a hen with a nest nearby..

Put up a stake in the middle of the plot with a picture of Dianne Fienstien on it..

The field I flushed them out of was ALIVE with grasshoppers....Those little peeps are getting lots of protein ...<<smile>>....

I had a brief brush with boxing years ago.. I shared a goose blind with Carmen Basilio's brother.....Hehehehe......

My Mom attended and took a ride in one when she was 80...The pilot told her she was the oldest person he ever took aloft....She thought it was pretty cool...Just the idea of it scares the crap out of me !

I went up to the property today to mow my clover plot for the final time this year and I flushed a hen and 5 poults... The hen was a BIG old girl, looked to be perhaps 14-15 pounds...The poults, however, were QUAIL size....They could fly, but just barely...They looked about half the size of grouse....I have never seen poults so small this late in the year..They wont be more than 4-5 pounds when the season opens...They are less than a month old....Probably they were the result of a renest..Older hens are more likely to renest when their original nest is disturbed than young hens.. On the same property, I saw a hen in June that had poults that were already pheasant size at that time... They have nothing to worry about from me...I am taking a sabbatical from fall hunting in this area until the flocks rebound a little...

I always skin and disjoint them in the woods....Google has a bunch of vids showing the easy way to do it, and it works slick and fast once you get the hang of it...I save 5 pieces..the 4 legs and the back...IMO the back has sufficient good meat to save... I have never gone so far as to ice them down, but when I come out of the woods all I have to do is rinse them and pick off a few hairs and they are ready for the pot...If I have shot them with a shotgun, I usually soak them in a mild solution of salt water overnight to help draw the blood out of the shot wounds..

The Mermaid has me doing so much crap on the property I haven't even THOUGHT about honkers.. I'll be with you in spirit, however...I truly LOVE the thump when a big honker hits the ground from about 30 yards up !!

Good reason....It came out in the mid 1960s when I was a wild and horny teenager... I'm no longer a teenager....Hehehehe....

Remember the old rock&roll song by the Troggs ??